SPD Publisher Resources
• Become an SPD Publisher
• SPD Fellowship Program
• Publisher Handbook
• New Titles Form
• How-To Videos
• Other Tools for Publishers
Contact by Areas of Responsibility:
Cover Scans and questions about book records: newtitles@spdbooks.org
Purchase Orders and Restocking Requests: po@spdbooks.org
Other questions about bibliographic data: metadata@spdbooks.org
Questions related to grants and individual donations: development@spdbooks.org
Publisher reports, account questions, and financial matters: accounts@spdbooks.org
General publicity and marketing questions: publicity@spdbooks.org
Orders and customer service: orders@spdbooks.org
Prospective publishers: acquistions@spdbooks.org
Publishing Timeline
Have questions about how to maximize your title's impact? We've put together the timeline below to help presses identifiy key milestones in the publication process. REMEMBER: Getting your title to us before it's pub date is critical to its success!
Click the image below to view the full-size timeline.
New Publisher Data Guide
To help new publishers acclimate to our services and staff, we've put together a handy guide with frequently asked questions. It's our hope that this guide can serve as a guiding light during your initial months with SPD. If you have a question that's not answered here, don't worry! Reach out to metadata@spdbooks.org and our staff will be happy to answer any questions you may have.
Click the image below to view the full-size Data Guide.
Marketing Opportunities for Publishers
Below is a list of ongoing marketing opportunities for SPD publishers. This list is by no means exhaustive, and if you have an idea for a new program or a novel way to promote your title, we'd love to hear it! Please send all suggestions and questions to publicity@spdbooks.org.
Handpicked: SPD’s marquee marketing program, Handpicked is a selection of four new titles that runs each month. Handpicked titles run with a 20% off promotion to drive sales and come with the following additional benefits:
- Prominently featured in the top and side navigation bars on the website.
- Slider on website homepage.
- Featured on at least one social media post each month.
- The subject of a dedicated newsletter to our full mailing list.
- Additionally, Handpicked titles are advertised on two different sites:
- The Los Angeles Review of Books
- LitHub
Payments on these advertisements are shared between the publishers of each month’s four featured titles. Because of this, the cost to feature a title on Handpicked for a given month is $225. For all inquiries about Handpicked, email Grant Kerber, Publicity & Marketing Manager, at grant@spdbooks.org.
NEW! Indie Update: Indie Update is a print magazine that goes out in all orders to independent bookstores and individuals buying through our website. Each edition of Indie Update contains ten titles, with a $125 cost to feature a title. The goal is to highlight recent titles in a way that connects with independent bookstore audiences and maintains momentum as in-person shopping continues to grow. Each edition of Indie Update features an eye-catching bird photo as its cover, because SPD staff like birds.
A preview of our Indie Update template is available here. If you're interested in featuring a title in the Indie Update, please email publicity@spdbooks.org.
SPD Recommends: SPD Recommends highlights 15 titles that are new to SPD and runs every two weeks.The SPD Recommends newsletter is a free and popular way to get your title before a large number of interested eyes. Additionally, SPD Recommends is featured on our website sidebar and frequently promoted by both SPD and the publishers that are featured. With each Recommends newsletter, we try to achieve a level of diversity that is reflective of our catalogue. While SPD Recommends is free, spots are limited. If you’re interested in having an upcoming title featured on SPD Recommends, email publicity@spdbooks.org and we’ll try to fit your title in.
SPD Bestseller Lists: SPD has three bestseller lists: Poetry, Fiction and Nonfiction. The Poetry list is released monthly, Fiction bi-monthly, and Nonfiction once a quarter. Each list is comprised of the bestselling titles which were released within the previous 14 months. Should your title make the list, resharing the success is a great way to drive further sales. Our community pays attention to the bestseller list, so mentioning that your title has appeared on the list helps attract interest. To further support this, we’ve created the badges linked below. They denote titles that have featured on the bestseller list as well as authors whose previous titles have made the list. Click each image below for a downloadable version of the file. For higher resolution or Photoshop versions of these files, contact Grant Kerber, Publicity & Marketing Manager, at grant@spdbooks.org
SPD Sales: SPD runs a number of sales throughout the year, typically offering 20% off on titles that fit a certain theme. We regularly run a solstice sale, back to school sale, summer sale, as well as sales revolving around awareness months. If you want your title promoted through an upcoming sale, just ask! Email publicity@spdbooks.org and we’ll try to find an appropriate opportunity to feature your title.
Trade Show Promotions: SPD exhibits at the Associated Writing Program conference, the Northern California Independent Booksellers Association, and at numerous other trade shows and conventions. We have historically gone to the MLA but are currently replacing that with participation in the ABA’s Winter Institute. Contact Grant Kerber at grant@spdbooks.org for information about these shows. Displaying at shows often requires additional co-op financial participation, but SPD tries to keep such fees as low as possible.
NetRead: SPD utilizes a service called JacketCaster, a NetRead product, to send out our book data on a monthly basis. Jacketcaster feeds ONIX-compliant bibliographic data for our titles to dozens of clients, including nearly all the major booksellers, jobbers, and middlepeople in the book business, in precisely the format they need. ONIX stands for Online Information Exchange and is the standardized format in which the book trade receives bibliographic data. Clients of Netread/Jacketcaster include Amazon, Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Barnes & Noble, Bowker, and a host of smaller entities. Although data feeds are not traditionally considered “marketing,” the data we send is searchable by keywords. Many books are purchased simply because their data is complete, in the right database, and can be searched for keywords that are important to the potential buyer. This underlines the importance of having good metadata for your title. If you’d like to learn more about creating good metadata, read our Metadata Guide.